


Non-stop Feelings Abound (NFA)

by Joeggernaut



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, Hexadecimal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2018-05-22 10:24:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 6,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6075741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joeggernaut/pseuds/Joeggernaut
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ladybug and Chat fight a computer based villain. Ooo, how modern.<br/>And they get sucked into a maze! A feelings maze! Made of feelings!<br/>How will they get out of this one?<br/>Tune in to find out!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. What's a Hexadecimal?

**Author's Note:**

> So I decided to write in present form and MAN WAS THAT A BAD IDEA. But you know, you gotta break out of your comfort zone and make obviously bad decisions every once in a while I suppose.

Ladybug was late. She frantically swings though the city. _The park,_ she thinks, _that’s where the akuma is!_ She rounds a corner and she’s there. Chat is also there. In front of him is a lazy looking woman sitting in a dark blue office chair. There’s a desk in front of her, floating.  She is facing what looks like a computer monitor. Ladybug swoops in and lands hard next to Chat.

“You know, the outdoors are supposed to give you a break from technology,” she quips.

“Ah, Ladybug finally shows up,” the woman states indifferently. “We can begin now.”

“How sweet, you all waited.”

“Careful LB,” Chat says, “She’s not playing around.” Lady turns to him and sees that he is holding his side. Is he hurt?

“Chat, are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” he assures, “with you here, this will be easy.” He smiles. That’s reassuring. She turns back to face their opponent. She swings her yo-yo and sprints head first at the seated woman.

“Malware Execute” The seated woman commands. In front of her desk a large, pixelated being appears. “Set power level to 0 9,” the woman continues, “attack target Ladybug.” The being lurches forward towards the advancing Ladybug and it forms a giant fist. She spins her yo-yo in front of her at a sharp speed, and the fist impacts it. The attack is forceful, but too weak. It bounces off of her shield. She swings the yo-yo across the fist and shatters it.

From behind, Chat vaults over her and rains a heavy hit with his staff on the creature. It folds on the impact, and the being takes a more fluid form. It retreats back.

“Looks like this is one thing you can’t _debug_!” Chat jests in a more confident tone. He glances at Ladybug, who nods in agreement.

The woman seems unfazed.

“Reform,” She commands, “Set power level to 1 8. Resume attack.”

“Doubling your attack won’t help,” Ladybug says, “I’ll smash you to _bits_.” Chat smiles at her pun. He loved it when she made them.

The creature advances and its fist raises. Ladybug forms her spinning protective shield and braces herself. _A hit twice as hard still won’t be enough_ , she thinks, _and this time we are close enough to get to her before it reforms._ Chat falls back and prepares to do another running strike. The creature is closing in.

It rains its fist down hard on her. She blocks the initial impact, but…but her arm is folding. The hit is hard; more than double the last hit. It pushes through her defenses. She takes the impact to the chest, and is sent flying back. Panicked, Chat frantically scrambles to her.

“Lady, what happened?” He asks concerned.

She’s not sure, the last hit was at level 9 and she’d blocked it easily. This hit was at level 18 but it was way more than she’d expected. It didn’t make sense.

“Chat move!” She yelled. But it was too late. The creature swipes at Chat, catching his side, and sends him flying across the park. The creature pins her to the ground.

On its blank face, a screen forms. A video of the akumized woman appears on it. She is smiling.

“Ah, Ladybug,” She says menacingly. “You seem confused. Do you really believe 1 8 is 9 times 2?” She laughs in a condescending tone.

Marinette’s favorite subject was not Math. She wasn’t a fan of algebra or geometry, but she wasn’t bad at it either. And she knew damn well that 9 x 2 = 18!

“What are you talking about?” She yells back to the woman, half confused, half angry.

The woman lets out a sigh.

“You’re thinking in _decimal_ dear. You need to think beyond your simple bases.” Ladybug wasn’t making heads or tails of what she was saying.

“What?” She asks again.

“Must I explain everything? What you used to count is base 10. That is, you have numbers 0 through 9 per digit. So once you count to 9 and add one more, what do you do? You add another digit to make 10. Remember 10 really is just 1 x 101 \+ 0 x 10. Got it?”

Ladybug wasn’t really expecting a math lesson right now. But if it could provide some clue on how to win, she’d listen. She nodded.

“Good. Now, imagine we change the base from 10 to 16. That would mean that we go all the way up to 15 before adding a new digit, understand? So 18 would no longer be 1 x 101 \+ 8 x 100 = 18. Instead it would be 1 x 161 \+ 8 x 160 = 24. So, 9 times 2 in this base would equal 24. Understand?”

This made sense. It explained why she couldn’t block the monster’s hit. He wasn’t hitting her with power level 18, but instead level 24.

“This is called Hexadecimal,” the woman continues. “Computers use it for most computations.”

“Is the math lesson over? I’m tired of your lecturing!”

The woman scoffed. 

“Yes, but first let me introduce myself, my name is RAM. That stands for Relentlessly Attacking Marie, who is me. I am researcher in the field of computers, or I was until **my funding was CANCELED!!** ” She exhaled loudly and recomposed herself. “Now,” she resumed in her normal, bored voice. “I need you and your little friend to help me with something.”

“Like we’d ever help _you!”_ Ladybug protests.

“LISTEN!” She yells, “This Hawkmoth character really wants me to take your miraculouses. However, I’m not finished with you yet. I need you for my research. ”

“Do we look like lab rats to you?”

RAM smiles.

“Yes, in fact you do.”

The screen shuts off. The creature squeezes her wrists tightly and slowly lowers itself onto her. She struggles in vain. Its malformed body contacts hers and passes through it. A cool feeling washes over her. She feels its weight. It feels as if she is being flattened. She gasps for air as her chest is compacted. It buries it face into hers, and she blacks out.


	2. LAByrinth time!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They enter the matrix. It's not as aesthetically pleasing. Well, at least Chat is wearing all black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maze time. Are you ready for a bunch of feelings!? 
> 
> No, okay well. They're going to happen I guess. So become prepared.

Ladybug woke up in a perfectly white room. Well, all except for her black suited companion. He was lying asleep near her.

“Chat,” she beckons, “Chat wake up.” She gets to her feet. The room is not only perfectly white, but it is also perfectly round. The ceiling was out of sight. The walls appeared to extend forever upwards. On the walls where two large steel doors. She notices that they had no handles or apparent hinges. Useless. Over the doors are framed words in black letters. One read **GUILT** , the other **SELF-CONFIDENCE**.

“Wh-, what happened?” Chat asks groggily. He rubs his eyes in a cat like fashion and glanced around the room.

“RAM trapped us in some room.” Ladybug explains. Chat sleepily looks around the room and yawns.

“So what is this? Her evil silo?”

“It looks like the only way out are these doors.”

“Guilt,” Chat reads, “and Self-Confidence. Weird names for rooms.”

“I’m not sure those are labels for the room.”

“Well, either way, I was having a purrfectly good cat nap. Why don’t we beat this RAM chick and get out of here.”

“Got any ideas?”

Chat smiles. “I’ve got one.” He winks at her. “I’ll rust this door to oblivion, no problem. CATA-“ he begins, but just then the door labeled Self-Confidence slides open. Chat stops mid-word, staring blankly.

That was unexpected.

“Well, well,” She teases, “Looks like you can save that for later.”

Chat lets out an embarrassed laugh and scratches the back of his head. His plan worked, he supposes, even If he didn’t actually do anything.

They proceed through the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huh, that chapter felt short. It's almost as if each chapter correlates to a room instead of an actual pause in the narrative.  
> *Wink*


	3. And behind door number 1 is...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One room down, potentially more to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What kind of Maze gives you a map?

As soon as they had both made it through the door it slammed closed. They look around the room. White. Round. Two doors. Same as last time. Although, this time the doors were labeled **ANNOYANCE** and **SHAME**. They glance at each other.

“Where are we?” Chat asks. “What does she just have a bunch of identical, weird rooms lying around?”

“In fact I do.” The dull voice of RAM rang out from the endless ceiling.

“RAM!” Ladybug yells. “Where have you taken us?”

“Don’t you remember? I need you for my research.”

“Research?” Chat asks confused. He wasn’t there for her initial explanation. RAM let out a menacing laugh.

“Yes Yes. Allow me to introduce myself again. I am RAM, a researcher studying the possibility of computational analysis of emotions. Sometimes referred to as Emotional Computers. Unfortunately, I have been unable to gather any good emotional data for my research because of those wretched whelps who decide funding! Fortunately for me, I have you all to observe.”

“Emotional What!?” Chat yells back, “You just made that up!”

“Oh, I assure you, it’s very real. In fact, I got quite some nice data from your little display of Self-Confidence back there.”

“Chat’s emotion opened the door!” Ladybug realizes. “That’s why it opened, isn’t it?”

“What a smart little _rat_ you are. Yes, the doors respond to your emotional state. I have trapped you in one of my favorite models. A Nondeterministic Finite Automata. NFA for short. Here, why don’t we take a look at your potential path together?”

Just then a large projection appeared on the wall in front of them.

“As you can see,” RAM’s voice drones on, “there are only certain paths you can take to reach the final state. That’s the double circle. Each circle represents a room. You’ve already been in the first one. ”

Ladybug’s heart sank. If only they’d taken the Guilt door, they’d only be two rooms away from her. But now their shortest path was 5 rooms away. Annoyance, Trust, Love, Hatred, Boredom. That’s all they needed.

“So if we can reach the double circle room we’re free?” Lady asks.

“If you reach that room I will have enough data to conduct my research, yes.”

That left only one thing to do. They had to get through the annoyance door. She glances over at Chat.

“Chat,” she commands, “tell me a joke.”

Chat gave her a strange look. He hadn’t understood this at all. Nondetermal finantial something. Doors labeled with emotion. He wasn’t making heads or tails of this.

“Why?”

“Because we need to get through the annoyance door.”

“But how would-,” he stops, realizing. “Hey my jokes are great!” He crossed his arms and pouted. He liked his jokes. She liked his jokes, he knew. Well, maybe not all of them. But most of the time they made her smile.

“Sure they are kitty,” she says dismissively. “Hurry up and say one.” Chat sighed. He thought of a really bad one.

“Why did the cat sleep all day?” Lady sighed.

“Why?”

“He was pro-cat-inating!” He says smiling. It was a terrible joke. Ladybug tried really hard to be annoyed at it. She closed her eyes and frowned. She peeked at the Annoyance door. Nothing. This wasn’t working. She wasn’t getting annoyed, really, she was just getting fake annoyed on purpose.

“This isn’t working; we need to get genuinely annoyed.”

“ _Well,_ I knew one of my great jokes wouldn’t have worked.”

Ladybug stood there trying to think of annoying things: homework, slow people on the sidewalk, crying babies, rude customers. She tried thinking of each of these things really hard, but none made her annoyed enough to open the door.

Chat eyes her. He has an idea.

“Yeah,” he says aloud, “that joke was pretty funny. You didn’t laugh though; you must have not got it.”

“I got the joke Chat,” ladybug states flatly. She was trying to think of something annoying. Think Ladybug, think!

“You sure?” Chat continues. “It was pretty clever. Want me to explain it to you?”

“No Chat. I’m trying to get us through the door.” She says in a harsher tone. “Why don’t you help and try to think of annoying things?”

“I think this is important.” When she ignores him, he presses her further. “So the joke is, the middle part of procrastination kinda sounds like the word cat. So, since the joke is about a cat, I-“

“I get the stupid joke Chat!” She yells angrily. “Would you HELP instead of just STANDING there with a smug look on your-“ She was interrupted by the sound of the annoyance door opening. She glances from the open door, back to Chat, back to the door again. She lets out a deep sigh. “Very clever,” she admits. “I’ll owe you for that.” Chat just smiled and walked toward the door. He lightly tapped her shoulder with his fist.

“Good companions always know just which buttons to press.” He says grinning. He vanishes through the door. She didn’t like how he said the word companions. She rolls her eyes and proceeds.


	4. Like I'm falling for that

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chat has more hasty ideas that may or may not work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's that you say? You're not sure if I'm writing them in character? 
> 
> Uhh, well, uh, I, uh...hey look down there! It's another picture!
> 
> (phew, that was close. You almost noticed)

She enters the room. Okay, next is Trust. She glances at the door. **TRUST** is in big bold letters. The other door has **HAPPINESS** above it.

“Which one are we going for, m’lady?” Chat asks. He checks to make sure that she isn’t still annoyed at him. But she’s cooled down.

“We need trust now.”

“Oh, well. If that’s the case, why not fall into my arms?” He reaches his arms out as if in an embrace.

“What?” She says giving him a questioning look.

“A _trust_ fall.” He states merrily. She groans. It’s not a bad idea, but she wasn’t really looking forward to it.

“Okay,” she reluctantly agrees. Chat giddily jumps into position behind her and holds out his arms.

“Don’t worry Bugaboo. I’ll catch you.” She rolled her eyes before closing them. She crosses her arms across her chest and lets her weight carry her back. She falls. 80 degrees, 70, 60, she starts to get nervous. 50, 45, she’s really falling! _Chat_ , she thinks, _you’re supposed to catch me!_

She was about to unwind when she felt his hands under her shoulder blades. She opened her eyes and stares into his. Deep green. They looked at her kindly. She stares for a moment longer. She felt a closeness to him. A nice warmth. But, was it trust? Or, something else…

He kneels down and raises her a bit so that her back is resting on his chest.

“You let me fall a long way,” She says, with hints of sweetness.

“I thought it would work better if you were falling hard for me.” He replies smiling. She reaches up and taps his bell with her finger.

“I’ll have to pay you back for that too,” she replies coolly. Chat’s smile grows into a grin. Just then a door shot open.

But it wasn’t the Trust door. Ladybug got to her feet, as did Chat. Happiness was open, but Trust was shut.

“It didn’t work,” she says disappointedly.

“Did you not trust me?” Chat asked confused. She turns to him.

“Of course I trusted you!” She shot back. She thinks to herself. “I don’t know how to show my trust. What does that even mean?”

“I’ll at a loss too,” Chat chimes in, “I trust you with everything, there’s nothing-…” he stops, trailing off. “Well, there is one thing we don’t trust each other with.” He states solemnly. He doesn’t need to finish.

“But that’s not a trust issue!” She protests, “that’s a-“

“I know. But, I can’t think of anything else.”

Reveal their identities? That was out of the question. There had to be something else.

“Now that I think about it,” Chat thought out loud, “Only one of us has to do it.” The annoyance door opened when only Lady had been annoyed. Chat could simply reveal himself and the door should open. Chat never really cared about keeping his identity a secret. He only did on her insistence.

“Ladybug if you wanted me to-“ He began.

“No, Chat stop,” She replies back. There had to be something else.

“Are you sure? Because if it’s just you, I’d-“

“Stop!” She sighed. “Forget it, this is taking too long. Let’s just go through the Happiness door, it’s already open.” She didn’t remember what came after the Happiness door; she just knew it was a longer route. _Better that than revealing themselves_ , she thinks, _or staying here forever_.

Before Chat could argue, she runs through the door.


	5. Right in the gut

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you've been following a long with the map, you know where this is leading.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Could I have scaled the picture down to not be so frickin' huge? Yeah, but I forgot to. And now I've set a precedent. Great

She runs into the next white, circular room. One door. **ANGUISH**.

 _Anguish_ , she thought, _How am I supposed to display anguish?_

Just then Chat caught up to her.

“Anguish,” he reads, “What like pain?” Ladybug nods.

“Something like that.” He crosses his arms and thinks of something to say.

“Being away from you would bring me great pain.” He says finally. She scoffs.

“Then open this door so I can leave.”

“Okay then.” He turns to face her. He puts his hands behind his back and puffs out his chest.

“What’re you doing?”

“One of us needs to be in pain. I won’t let it be you, so it’ll have to be me,” He states confidently. “A punch to the gut ought to do it.”

“Are you serious?”

“Well, I don’t have any other ideas.” She eyed him for a moment. Then she shrugs, it’s was a decent enough plan. She’d hit Chat before, granted he was usually possessed when it happened.

Besides, she did still owe him for the Annoyance room.

She struck a stance, lined up a hit, and gave Chat a light punch to the stomach. Her fist hit the hard resistance of his abs. _His abs?_ she thought, _Was he flexing?_

“Chat!” She calls. “Stop flexing!” Chat grins.

“Oh, sorry my lady, I thought it was going to hurt. I guess my abs where a little more impressive than we thought.” He says, tapping his stomach with his fingers cockily. Lady frowned.

“No, no. Keep flexing. I’ll make it hurt.” She says coolly, and positions herself again.

“Uh-,” he hesitates, “Wait, maybe-“ But before he finishes she rams a hard fist into his gut. His abs didn’t stop her this time. He bent over and staged back a bit, groaning. The Anguish door opened behind them. She smiles at the open door.

“Good work partner.” She says triumphantly. Chat was still bent over. She walks over to him and gently places a hand on his back. “Come on Chat, deep breaths,” She encourages. He feigns a smile.

“You really pack a punch.”

“Come on kitty, the door is this way,” She says leading Chat through the door.


	6. Is this what you call interesting?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally we get back to math.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You ready for that hexadecimal? Cause I am.

Chat and Ladybug crossed the threshold and door shut behind them. Two doors this time: **INTEREST** and **ANGST**. Ladybug had never really thought of interest being an emotion, but she supposed it could be.

“So,” she says, “I don’t remember which is faster. Take your pick.”

Chat glances between the doors. Angst or Interest. If he were to change back into Adrien he’d doubtless be able to open angst easily. But that wasn’t an option.

“I’m always showing interest in you Ladybug,” he says, wiggling his eyebrows.

“I’m feeling like I should hit you again,” she replies in good spirit. “Is interest your final choice?” He shrugs.

“Just tell me something interesting,” he says. Ladybug thinks for a second. Something interesting. It was always really hard to think of something interesting when you had to. She thought about her day and what she’d been doing earlier.

“Well,” she begins, “I was knitting earlier, I guess.” That wasn’t very interesting. However, Chat jumped on this immediately.

“Wait, _you_ knit?”

“Yes,” she replies somewhat defensively. He looks astonished.

“Wow, I would have never guessed that. I know, like, maybe one other person who knits.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing, nothing. Keep talking about knitting.”

“Well,” she says scrambling for ideas, “there’s really not much to it.”

“How does it work?” he probes. Ladybug closes her eyes and tried to imagine that she’s sitting in her room, as Marinette, working her needles.

“So, uh, there are two kinds of stitches. A knit stitch and a purl stitch. And you just, kinda, use them at different times to make a pattern.” She turns to look at him. He’s sitting down and looking very bored.

“Are you even listening?” She asks annoyed.

“What? Oh yeah, knitting. It’s very exciting.” He says sarcastically. She crosses her arms and kicks him lightly in the side.

“Well, I don’t see you coming up with anything interesting!”

Chat examines the ground for a while, and then glares up at her with a sinister smile. He stands up and moves closer to her. She’s confused. He leans in close.

“I just thought of a few ways to make things interesting between us,” he says in a cool, flirtatious voice.

This again?  She groans and pushes his face away.

“Come on Chat, this is serious. We’re running out of time.” They’d been stuck is maze for a decently long time now. Their transformations weren’t going to last forever.

“You know what I want to know,” Chat said finally.  “Why did RAM’s attack earlier seem so much more powerful than we expected. She said power level 18. Was she just lying or something?”

“Oh, no, she explained it to me actually. It wasn’t level 18 it was 24.”

“What? I was pretty sure she said 18.”

“Well she did, but she mentioned something about hexadecimal…Does that mean anything to you?”

Chat shrugged. “Nope, never heard of it.”

“It was like, something to do with base 16. And we use base 10, or something…”

“Oh, wait, actually that does ring a bell.” He says tapping his neck bell as he spoke. “That reminds me of Binary.”

“Binary?”

“Yeah, you know the whole 1s and 0s thing?”

“Not really.”

“Oh, well it’s like base 2 counting.” This was sounding familiar to her.

“Yeah, RAM said something about base 16 counting.”

“Hmm,” Chat thought for a moment, “OOOOH, that makes sense kind of.”

“What does?”

“So, like,” he says trying to find the right words, “Binary works by being like, every digit is either a 0 or 1. So 1 is just 1, but if you want to count higher you have to move over a digit. So like 2 in binary is 1, 0. Three is 1, 1. Then for 4 you add another digit and reset the last ones again. So 4 is like 1, 0, 0.”

Ladybug thought about this for a moment.

“So,” she began, “five would be, 1, 0, 1?”

“Yeah, right! So that’s for base 2.” He explained. She sort of understood now.

“Oh, I see. So for base 16, she said 1, 8, which is really one 16 and eight 1s. Then 16 + 8 is 24… Okay, now I see.”

That made sense. Each subsequent digit represented a different power of 16. So 100 in base 16 would be 1 x 162 \+ 0 x 161 \+ 0 x 160 = 256.  And 100 in binary (base 2) would be 1 x 22 \+ 0 x 21 \+ 0 x 20 = 4. It all made sense.

Along with the satisfaction of understanding binary and hexadecimal, Chat and Ladybug were rewarded with the Interest door sliding open. They went through it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does it make sense? I wanted it to make sense but it might not. 
> 
> Little Quiz:  
> What are the following Hexadecimal numbers in decimal form:  
> ex: 48 = 72  
> 1\. 30  
> 2\. 92  
> 3\. 4A
> 
> Leave your answers in a comment!  
> Or if you have questions leave a comment too!


	7. Love you say?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> *Chanting* Love door Love door

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you made it this far, first, thanks for reading! I really appreciate it. 
> 
> But I'm gonna be honest. I'm not overly fond of this story. I feel like I can do better, less robotic writing. 
> 
> But you go to war with the army you've got. Or in this case, you write a fan fic with the skills you have....that sounds less cool.

 

The room with the Love door. This was the one room Chat had remembered. His eyes light up when he catches sight of the sign. _Finally_ , he thinks, _it’s time_.

He turns to her and grabs her hand. He brings it up to his mouth and lightly pecks it.

“Well, well,” he says smoothly. “I know which door I want to go through.”

Fortunately, Ladybug had also thought about this door and had come up with several work arounds to avoid this type of thing. She pulled her hand out of his.

“You know kitty,” she says tapping him on the nose. “There’s more than one kind of love. For example, I’m going to think about my family and how important they are to me.” She steps away from him and closes her eyes, thinking deeply about her mother and father, their bakery, their smiles, their warmth. Love came much easier to her than annoyance or interested did.

Chat, on the other hand, hated this plan. First off, it totally subverted his glorious plan of getting close to Lady. Secondly, it’s not _he_ could think about his family for this. Love wasn’t the only emotion his father brought up in him. It was, more complicated than that. He decided to sit this one out and let Lady be the love-bug for once.

It took about a minute for her to hear the door slide. She opened her eyes. She lets all her warm loving feeling out in one deep breath. She turns to Chat, smiling. But he isn’t smiling back.

“The door’s open Chat,” She announces. He glances over at it and shrugs. _He’s being so childish_ , she thinks. But it’s also kind of cute. He must have really been looking forward to this room. Too bad she had to disappoint.

It’s not that she didn’t love Chat or anything. Just not in a romantic way. They were partners, friends. He was fun to have around, most of the time, but she didn’t like him like…like how she felt about Adrien. Chat was really great, but Adrien was just so, so handsome, and kind, and sweet, and cute, and nice, and just, just perfect! And Chat, well, wasn’t. It wasn’t a fair contest. He could never win.

But even if Adrien wasn’t in the picture, Chat was just so…Over the top on everything. Sure it was cute sometimes, but other times it was just too much. Regardless, the door was open now. They need to get moving.

“Sorry to disappoint,” she soothes, “but we really have to get a move on.” Chat sighs, but he smiles anyway.

They walk through the door together.


	8. Hate to be Embarrassed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hate, as they say, is a strong word.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's my typo count? Like ~200? 
> 
> ...All intentional I assure you.

Two options: **HATRED** and **EMBARRASSEMENT**. Ladybug stares at the hatred door. That’s where they need to go.

“Anything you hate Chat?” She asks, pointing to the door.

“Tch, I can’t think of hate when I’m around you,” he coos.

“Well you better try. We need to get through that door.”

“I’ll try to come up with something.” Chat sits down, cross-legged. What did he hate? Hate was a rather strong emotion. He racks his brain. Hawk Moth is a contender. He was the source of all their problems. However, Chat didn’t really know anything about him. Other than him wanting to steal his ring. Why did he want the miraculouses anyway? Every time Chat thought about it he turned up nothing. Could he really hate a man whose intensions where unknown? Could he really hate anyone at all?

Chat wasn’t sure that he’d really even felt hate. He must have, at some point, but right now he couldn’t remember it. Hawk Moth is clearly a bad guy, but, if it wasn’t for him, Adrien would never have to be Chat. He’d have no reason to patrol. He’d have no reason to see Ladybug! Ladybug. Without Hawk Moth, would he ever see her again? Would they just, you know, quit? He didn’t like that thought. But he couldn’t bring himself to truly hate Hawk Moth. Not with these questions unanswered. And if he couldn’t hate him, he probably couldn’t hate anybody. Useless.

Ladybug was having no better luck. Who did she hate? Chloe? Maybe a little. But Hate was too strong of an emotion for that. Hawk Moth? Maybe. But even he never really seemed real to her. She knew that he had to exist. But they’ve never seen him, never heard him. He could be anyone. Sure he was evil and caused a lot of problems. But how was she supposed to hate someone she’d never seen or met? No, he wouldn’t do.

But what did that leave her with? Nothing? Did she really hate nothing? Sure, she hated homework, and showing up late to class, and waking up early. But, like, how does she recreate that? It didn’t seem possible. What would she do?

Just then, her miraculous gives off its first beep.

_NO!_ she thinks, _I’m going to change back soon. We have to get moving!_

“Chat!” She says alarmed, “We’re running out of time!”

“I know! But, I don’t think I hate anything!” He replies. “What about you?” She shakes her head. This was not good.

“Maybe,” he suggests, “we should try going for the embarrassment door instead.” She stops to consider this. It was a longer path. She didn’t remember what comes after it. But Hate didn’t seem to be getting anywhere. Embarrassment should be easy though, she was Marinette after all.

“Fine,” she agrees, “We’ll go through embarrassment. Just hurry.”

“Okay, how about you tell me an embarrassing story!” He suggests. She stares at him.

“Me!? Why me?”

“Well because,” He says assuredly. “I never do anything embarrassing.” He winks.

She rolls her eyes. _Everything you do ought to be embarrassing_ , she thinks. But there’s no time.

“Fine” she agrees. Something embarrassing, something embarrassing. As Marinette, she does something embarrassing about once every five minutes. Mostly while Adrien is there.

“Okay,” She starts, “I got one.”

“Let’s hear it.”

“So, uh, earlier today. I was walking and I totally tripped in fell in front of this, guy, and I was holding this-“

“Wait, hold on,” Chat says sternly. “What guy?”

_Oh lord_

“Oh, uh,” she says, slightly flustered, “just, one of my...a friend.”

“One of your friends?” Chat repeats skeptically. “Just that? A friend?”

“W-well, yeah.” She stammers, she was feeling less and less like Ladybug and more as Marinette as this went on. “He’s just like, my friend. It’s not like we’re dating or anything.”

“DATING!??” Chat yells indignantly.

“NO! NO! I said we were NOT dating!” She was fully flustered now. Why was she talking to Chat about Adrien? Why did she think this would be a good idea? Couldn’t she have just gone with a childhood memory instead??

Chat was quiet for a moment. Should he press this?

“So what is he to you?” he asked solemnly. 

“I-I, well,” she groped for words. Her face was becoming as red as her outfit. “I…I…I don’t want to talk about it!”

“DO you like him?”

“NO!” She lied, now beet red. “A-anyway, I fell right in front of him and dropped all my things,” She finishes, reliving the embarrassment of that moment. Ugh, what an awful memory. With that, the door slid open.

“Tch,” was all Chat let out. He crossed his arms annoyed. He can’t believe there was someone else. He had suspected it, but he’d really wished he was wrong. _Damn_.

“Come on Chat,” Lady beckons as she runs through the door. 

_Damn_.


	9. Getting the hang of this now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fun Fact: This chapter is very short!

Ladybug rushes into the room to read the signs. **JEALOUSY** and **WONDER**. She considers these for a moment. She hears the second beep of her miraculous. She needs to move now! _Think!_

But her thinking was wasted. Within moments of Chat entering the room, Jealousy shot open.

“Good!” Ladybug praises as she rushes through the door.  Chat scoffs. He looks down at his ring as it emits its first beep.

_Whatever_.


	10. Is Indifference an emotion?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wikipedia thinks so.

Chat slowly makes his way into the new room to find Ladybug frantically trying to decide which door to proceed through. He looks up at the labels. **INDIFFERENCE** , one read. Chat was feeling some of that right now, honestly. **PITY,** said the other.

“Chat!” Ladybug calls out when she catches sight of him, “Help me out here!” Chat remains silent and walks up to her. He reaches for her hand, but decides to stop.   
“Is?” He asks in a quiet voice, “Is there really a guy you like?” She looks over at him, annoyed. This was NOT the time for that! She was about to tell him so when she got a good look at him.

 His ears were drooped. Eyes sad. He’d looked like he’d just been crushed. She softened.

“No, Chat look, I-“ She starts, but is cut off by the sound of the Pity door opening behind them.

Chat looks from her, to the door, back to her and sighs, turning away.

“Chat!” Ladybug calls. “Stop!”

“No need,” he says dejected, “I get it.”

“No, I’m not pitying you because of that.” She had to think of something clever. “I am pitying you because, you, uh, are misunderstanding!”

He glances back, interested. “Misunderstanding?”

“Yeah,” Ladybug lies, trying to come up with something good. “The guy I was talking about isn’t a love interest, he’s a, umm, teacher.”

“A teacher?” He asks with more color in his voice. "I thought you said friend."

“Oh, yeah! I meant teacher. He’s super famous and successful. And I really want to impress him! So that’s, uh, why…”

“OOOOHHH!” Chat says. “I get it. You’re afraid he won’t like you.”

“Uh, yeah, sure, that.” Ladybug agrees. _Whatever you say Chat._  Chat swoops over to her and smiles.

“Well don’t worry about that my lady; you couldn’t make a bad impression if you tried.” He knew there was no guy.

Lady sighed. _If only that were true_ , she thought.

“So we’re all good?” She asked.

“Sure!” Chat responds cheerfully. If it’s a teacher, it’s no problem. He didn’t care about that.

As if she needed proof, the Indifference door slid open.

“Two options,” Chat says, “take a guess?”

Ladybug was about to say something clever when she heard her miraculous beep for the third time. _NO!_

Without a word, she sprints through the Indifference door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1 more door!


	11. Passion is the pits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Short moments of fluff are better than none, right?

Ladybug darts into the room. **PASSION, DREAD**. She was feeling some dread right now, and as such the door slid open. However, she remembered that the Passion door led to the end. If she recalled correctly, it was Passion or Boredom.

If that was the case, Passion would have to do. She was way too anxious for any Boredom right now.

She needed passion. But how? She didn’t have time to think. She did the first thing that popped in her head.

“LUCKY CHARM” she hears herself yelling and she launches her yo-yo into the air. A glimmer of hearts burst out and from its center a picture frame falls down. She catches it in her hands.

It was a lovely, black framed picture.

Of Adrien.

She stared down at it in disbelief.

Passion. That was the goal. Passion. And her Lucky Charm, gives her a picture of Adrien….

_What am I supposed to do with this? Make out with it!?_

Her heart skips a beat when she hears the fourth beep of her miraculous. One left. And she used Luck Charm. Why did she DO THAT!?

Just then Chat finally makes it into the room.

“Sorry, I got-.” But he doesn’t finish. He looks at her holding the picture frame.

“What’s that?” He asks. She doesn’t respond. No time. Passion. She has to act. She’s out of moves.

_Well, you know what they say about desperate times…_

Ladybug flings herself at the unsuspecting Chat. She throws her body against his and grabs the back of his head. She presses her lips into his and closes her eyes. Passion, this was the only way.

His hair is fluffy, she notices as she feels at it with her fingertips. At first he was very stiff and surprised to find her kissing him. But now he was loose and soft. _And Warm._ He was pressing himself onto her with equal force now. He gently bit at her lower lip. It felt, good. He wrapped his arms around her back and caressed her lightly.

She almost didn’t hear the door open. But when she realized it had, she ripped herself away from Chat.

_No time_ , she thought as she darts through the opening. Leaving Chat on his own to make sense of what just happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I still think she should have made out with the picture. But that's just me.


	12. Final State

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is it. The terminating chapter.

RAM is sitting at her desk, looking very pleased. This data is good. Better than she thought even. She didn’t even notice the approaching Ladybug coming at her at mach speed.

Ladybug B-lines right at her, still holding Adrien’s picture. She winds the picture back and chucks it. RAM turns just in time to get smacked in the forehead with the picture frame. She falls backwards out of her chair.

Ladybug jumps onto her now empty chair and looks wildly at the desk.

_Something here must house the Akuma! But what!?_

Without much consideration, Ladybug begins indiscriminately smashing everything on the desk. The monitor, the keyboard, the mouse, everything. Yet, no butterfly.

_Where is it?_

Just then, ladybug remembered that the computer was under the desk. She ducked her head under and caught a glimpse of the humming PC. With a mighty force, she rams a kick right into it. The computer flies across the room. From the broken carcass, a lone black butterfly flutters out.

Ladybug practically throws her yo-yo across the room and to de-evilize it.

When the white butterfly flaps away she grabs the frame and uses to Miraculous Ladybug to release them from the trap.  

\---

She opens her eyes to see artificial light. A tunnel. She must be in the underground. That was fine. As long as the day was saved it was fine. She could feel the miraculous wearing off.  She was about to move away when she felt a tight grip around her wrist. She turned.

Chat was staring at her.

“Ladybug wait! I need to-“

“No!” was all she yelled out as her disguise wore off. Her suit disappeared off of her body. Her yo-yo, her ribbons, gone. Ladybug ceased to exist. Only Marinette remained. She turns away from him so that he wouldn’t see her face. But she knew it was too late. He’d probably seen it. She glances down at Tiki who is lying in her freed open hand. Tiki gives her a worried look. She shuts her eyes tight and waits for the inevitable.

There was a long moment of silence. Chat’s grip loosens and he finally releases her. She brings her hand in front of her, pressing it into her other palm. She peeks over at Chat.

But he’s not looking at her. His head is turned away, and his arm is covering his eyes.

“I, uh,” he begins to say, “didn’t see anything.” Marinette turns to face him now.

“W-well, I did see that you wear a gray jacket. But that’s not a big deal, right?” She doesn’t want to answer him, not as Marinette. She backs away from him.

She’s about to turn and run when she hears him call out, “Wait!”

She stops, and looks back at him.

“I’m sorry,” is all she manages to say before she runs off into the darkness.

Chat reaches out, but he knows she is gone. He silently counts to ten in his head before he opens his eyes and lowers his arm. Empty. She’s escaped from him again. But it won’t be forever, he knows.

He hears footsteps behind him. He turns to see a very lost and very confused computer scientist wandering around aimlessly. He puts on a greeting smile and calls over to her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WAIT THAT'S IT? 
> 
> This is a bunch of bull. That's how I end it? Dang. 
> 
> Well anyway, thanks for reading!


End file.
